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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27706376">when it hurts you (it hurts me too)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/onceandfuturewarlock/pseuds/onceandfuturewarlock'>onceandfuturewarlock</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>tumblr prompts [3]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Merlin (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Gen, Gwen gets mentioned but I couldn't think of a way to add her in :(, Post-Magic Reveal</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-11-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-11-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 14:34:13</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,559</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27706376</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/onceandfuturewarlock/pseuds/onceandfuturewarlock</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt: Merlin accidentally hurts Arthur with his magic, and freaks out about it.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Merlin &amp; Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>tumblr prompts [3]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2026366</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>173</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>when it hurts you (it hurts me too)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>"When it hurts you, <br/>It hurts me, too, <br/>Don't want to feel like this, <br/>Without you here."</p>
<p>- "When It Hurts You", The Paper Kites</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Arthur had all of ten seconds to get out of range and, as it turned out, ten seconds wasn't nearly enough.</p>
<p>To tell the truth, he knew it was all his own fault—he hadn't tried or, at least, he hadn't tried hard <em>enough</em>, mostly because he didn't <em>want </em>to get out of range, he didn't want to <em>run away</em>, and he certainly didn't want to leave Merlin behind to face the mad old witch entirely on his own. For all his magic, for all his power and know-how and strange, old-soul wisdom, Merlin was a right idiot most of the time and, while Arthur trusted him to take down an obviously mediocre, middle-of-the-road sorceress alone, he most definitely did <em>not</em> trust him to be smart about it. He didn't trust Merlin to be smart about most things, come to that, but magical battles with evil sorcerers was settled firmly at the top of the list.</p>
<p>But it didn't do an ounce of good, because Arthur couldn't get near enough to land a blow on the old woman, and he couldn't even get near enough to watch Merlin's back like he should, like he usually did in these sorts of situations—the spells flew far too thick and fast around the quiet green grove, blinding bursts of color and light flashing like suns and stars in the deep shadows of the wood, curses rebounding like stray cannonballs off the trees and boulders and branches—no, he could only stand there, sword in his hand, out on the edge of the battle, completely useless.</p>
<p>All of a sudden, the old witch stopped, her wrinkled hands still held out in front of her, and she said something—it didn't sound like magic, it didn't sound like a spell, and it didn't look much like magic, either, it looked like she was<em> talking</em> to Merlin, like she was talking and she wanted him to talk <em>back</em>, but Arthur couldn't hear the words over the whispers and rustles of all the sorcery in the grove—and it <em>must </em>have been magic, he realized, hardly half a second later, because a high, howling wind whipped up, right in the middle of the forest, on a cloudless, sunny day.</p>
<p>She must be a bit better than mediocre, then, she must be a bit more than middle-of-the-road, if she could call up storms like Merlin could—</p>
<p>The wind picked up, stronger and stronger until the shriek of it was all Arthur could hear, until the force of it nearly ripped his cloak from his shoulders and clawed the sword from his hand, until it pushed him back, farther and farther away from the old witch, away from Merlin, until it finally grabbed him up in its screaming grip and slammed him, with a nasty crunch, back into the nearest tree.</p>
<hr/>
<p>As near as Arthur could figure out, from the flashes of blue sky rushing past over his head and the fleeting glimpses of Merlin's bone-white face and terrified blue eyes, he had come back 'round on the way back to the castle, but he hadn't stayed awake long enough to remember much, and Merlin had, apparently, defeated the old woman mere moments after Arthur had blacked out, but he never heard the whole of it, and Merlin never told him.</p>
<p>All he could say for certain was, when he had finally opened his eyes to find himself in Gaius' chambers, in the rickety white cot reserved solely for the very ill, the old man had forced him to choke down a vast number of horrible potions and medicines before he had allowed Arthur to settle back in his own bedchamber.</p>
<p>It had seemed an awful lot of fuss for nothing but a broken arm and a few bruised ribs, and, if he had to make a guess, he would say the whole thing had upset Merlin rather more than he had thought it would, and certainly a great deal more than it had any right to—the idiot had turned into the perfect servant in the week since, nothing but <em>yes Sire </em>or <em>no Sire</em> or <em>let me get that for you, Sire</em>, not one gripe or grumble or complaint to be had, and never more than ten steps from Arthur's bedside.</p>
<p>And he didn't make a face when Arthur told him to muck the stables, and he didn't breeze in to work a half hour too late Arthur's breakfast in one hand and a sheepish smile on his face, and he didn't throw the curtains wide and shout <em>good morning</em> like he wanted to wake the entire castle, and he hadn't spilled wine in Arthur's lap even once, and he hadn't used his magic to heat the bathwater, or scrub the floor, or make the bed, and Arthur's armor had literally never shined brighter, a dazzling silver gleam out of the corner of his eye, glinting and flashing in the light of the sun through the open window.</p>
<p>It was absolutely unbearable.</p>
<p>And it was obviously much more than the usual mother-hen impulses Merlin fell into when Arthur got hurt, because he certainly hadn't acted like this even when Arthur had gotten a bite from the <em>Questing Beast</em>, when Arthur had, very literally, <em>cheated death</em>, and survived the unsurvivable!</p>
<p>No, this was bigger than all Merlin's girlish little fits and frenzies of fear, this was more than his everyday panic over nothing, and Arthur was<em> not</em> going to put up with it one moment longer.</p>
<p>"All right," he said, eight days out from that fight in the forest with the old witch, his arm still wrapped firmly in a simple white sling, and the bruising on his ribs a touch lighter now, and certainly less painful, "out with it, Merlin, what is it? What's gotten into you lately?"</p>
<p>"Sorry?" Merlin said, flatly, and he didn't even look up from where he had crouched down to pick up all the dirty laundry scattered 'round the chamber. "Not sure what you mean."</p>
<p>Arthur rolled his eyes. "Don't be an idiot, Merlin, you and I both know that suits you a bit too well."</p>
<p>"Yeah," Merlin said blandly, stuffing Arthur's brown trousers in his basket, "just one of my many gifts, Sire."</p>
<p>"Merlin," Arthur sat up a little in his seat, and put down his quill with a soft swish of the long white feather on parchment, "what's going on?"</p>
<p>"Nothing," Merlin said at once. He tossed a pair of socks in the basket, too. "It's nothing."</p>
<p>Arthur waited.</p>
<p>Merlin straightened up and turned his back on Arthur to pluck a red tunic up off the floor and plop it down in the basket with everything else.</p>
<p>Arthur waited a bit more.</p>
<p>All of a sudden, Merlin stopped, with the basket perched on the end of the bed, his hands still clinging to the wooden rim, and<em> finally</em>, Arthur thought, with a rush of relief, <em>finally, he's going to stop being such a girl and just tell me</em>—</p>
<p>Merlin sniffled.</p>
<p>Arthur's insides turned to ice. Oh, God, no, this was a mistake, this was a terrible, awful, horrendous mistake, and now Merlin was having feelings, and what if Merlin wanted to talk about those feelings, couldn't he just give Merlin the day off and let him sort it out on his own time, wasn't that a thing he could do, or would that be "insensitive" and "rude" the way Guinevere always told him, would that make him a "bad friend" the way Guinevere always told him—? "Um," he said, a little blankly, and a lot desperately, "y-you don't need to—you shouldn't—erm—"</p>
<p>"I—" Merlin wiped at his face with the back of his hand, and turned to look at Arthur, his eyes red and puffy, his cheeks sticky and stained with tears, "—I-I'm <em>sorry</em>."</p>
<p>"For crying?" Arthur said, rather weakly, and also rather hopefully.</p>
<p>"I should have said it sooner, but I thought you were going to—to bring it up, and I thought you were going to be angry, so I-I just waited and waited, but you <em>didn't</em>—"</p>
<p><em>Not</em> for crying, then, Arthur concluded dismally, before he scraped up the last remnants of his dwindling-in-the-face-of-a-crying-Merlin courage. "Why on earth did you think I'd be<em> angry</em> with you?"</p>
<p>"<em>I</em> did this to you," Merlin said, looking for all the world like a deeply repentant puppy left out in the pouring rain, waiting to be kicked. "I<em> hurt</em> you. I-I used my magic to h-hurt you."</p>
<p><em>What? </em>Arthur blinked a bit dazedly at Merlin while he waited for the words to make some sort of sense. "Hang on," he said, slowly, mostly to make sure he had this absolutely right, "<em>you</em> were the one who called up that wind? <em>You </em>were the one who—?"</p>
<p>Merlin blinked back, just as dazedly. "Y-You didn't know?"</p>
<p>"I thought it was the witch!" Arthur said, thoroughly baffled now. "What in God's name did you do that for? You never do storms unless it's—!"</p>
<p>"I got angry," Merlin said miserably. He sniffled again and wiped at his nose now. "I—I got so angry, she—she said some things that made me realize she was—she was somebody that had done really awful things, she had—she had hurt someone I know, she'd hurt her really badly, and I lost my temper, and—" he flicked a mournful glance up at Arthur from under his wet lashes, "—and it just happened, and Arthur, I'm<em> so sorry</em>!"</p>
<p>Arthur almost crumpled right back down in his seat again. Merlin had conjured up that wind, not the old witch, and oh, that made sense now, didn't it, he had thought, even then, the old woman hadn't seemed strong enough for magic like that, he had thought she hadn't had the power for a thing like that, and he had been right, and—</p>
<p>—and if she was so mediocre and middle-of-the-road, what on earth had she done in her past, to make Merlin so furious with her? "Is she—?" Arthur raised his head to look at his friend on the other side of the room. "Is she all right? The friend that the witch hurt? Is she all right now?"</p>
<p>Merlin stared blankly back at him, blue eyes wide and wet. "That's—?" he scrubbed at his nose again. "<em>That's </em>what you're worried about? Not the fact that<em> I almost killed you</em>?"</p>
<p>Arthur almost laughed. "It's a broken arm, Merlin, and it's not even my sword arm! Honestly, I hardly think I'm going to drop dead all because—"</p>
<p>"It's <em>not funny</em>," Merlin snapped, his every word sharp as a knife when it rolled off his tongue. "It's not funny, Arthur, this isn't a joke! I almost killed you! I almost killed you because I lost my temper! Because <em>I lost control</em>!"</p>
<p>"Yes," Arthur conceded, "but everyone loses their temper at some point, I wouldn't worry about it if I were—"</p>
<p>"Well, you're <em>not</em> me!" Merlin bit out. "And count yourself lucky on that, because when you lose your temper, you don't have to worry that you'll wipe out the entire kingdom, or—or level a whole forest, or put all your friends in danger just because you can't—!"</p>
<p>"M-Merlin," Arthur said, too startled to stay silent any longer, "of course you're not going to—"</p>
<p>"You don't know that!"</p>
<p>"No, I <em>don't </em>know that!" Arthur said sharply, a bitter burn of fury in the back of his throat, because what the hell was wrong with this idiot, why the hell couldn't he <em>see</em>—? "You're right, Merlin, I don't <em>know</em> that, I don't know for absolutely certain that you are never going to do something horrible, but I <em>trust</em> that you won't! I don't know, I can't tell the future, I'm not a Seer, but I trust you to do what's right and to never take it too far, and isn't that enough for you?"</p>
<p>For a moment that felt very much like forever, Merlin only looked at Arthur, his eyes still red, a few stray tears still trailing lazily down his wet cheeks. "But look at what I did to you," he whispered. "You can't honestly tell me you're not angry with me."</p>
<p>Arthur let out a soft, heavy sigh, and rubbed a hand down the side of his face. Yeah, sure, he was a bit put out, but mostly he was put out that he had gotten stuck in bed for three days straight, and that Merlin had decided to hedge around the problem for so long when he could have come to Arthur and told the truth straight-out, but it was like he had said to Merlin—everybody lost their temper now and then, it was hardly some sort of bone-deep sin Merlin had to atone for every day for the rest of his life.</p>
<p>"You can't honestly tell me," Merlin said, and even softer than a whisper now, softer than a breath, "that you're not scared of me."</p>
<p><em>Oh.</em> Arthur's chest squeezed with something almost like pity.<em> Oh, that's what this is, that's what he thinks, that's what he's so worried about</em>— "Merlin," he said, and he meant it, "I'm not scared of you. There's nothing in you to be afraid of."</p>
<p>"Except the magic that could have broken your <em>neck</em>," Merlin snapped, voice high and tight and still thick with tears. "You don't have to pretend, Arthur, you don't have to put on some kind of front for me, I understand, I <em>get it</em>—"</p>
<p>"You can't swing a sword without almost impaling yourself on the blade," Arthur pointed out. "You can't go an entire day without tripping over your own boots and falling flat on your face. There's nothing in you to be afraid of, and trust me, I'm <em>not </em>flattering you when I say that."</p>
<p>Merlin stared at Arthur like he had never seen him before, his eyes enormous in his tear-streaked face, one hand halfway up to dry the damp trails on his cheeks again. "Y-You're <em>not</em>—?"</p>
<p>"For God's sake, no!" Arthur rolled his eyes. "One time, I heard you say <em>sorry</em> to a <em>butterfly</em>!"</p>
<p>"I startled her," Merlin said, at once, and scrubbed at his eyes again. "I hit the branch she was resting on with my elbow, and I startled her."</p>
<p>Arthur had to bite back a smile. "Yes, I'm absolutely terrified. Shaking in my boots, Merlin, please don't kill me with your evil temper and big bad sorcerer powers."</p>
<p>Merlin turned a little pink. "I'm sorry," he said, hoarsely. "I really didn't mean to hurt you."</p>
<p>"Yeah, I picked up on that, believe it or not."</p>
<p>Merlin went a touch pinker, but he pushed on valiantly. "I-I didn't realize you were near enough to get hurt. I should have been more careful with you."</p>
<p>"<em>Careful with me</em>?" Arthur echoed incredulously, half-offended and half-amused. "Tell me, Merlin, how is it that <em>I'm</em> the one who got thrown into a tree, <em>you're</em> the one crying about it, and you still manage to make me sound like the delicate maiden in this situation?"</p>
<p>Merlin wiped at his nose again. "Should have known you'd be all right," he said, finally, and unless Arthur was very much mistaken, he could swear he saw a small smile tug at the edge of the idiot's lip. "Should have figured your thick skull would cushion the blow."</p>
<p>"<em>Mer</em>lin—!"</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>in other news, this is legit the most galaxy-brained prompt i have ever received in all my years of existence. wtf. why didn't i think of this first??? because i'm not cool &amp; sexy enough that's why. </p>
<p>old witch was (obviously) the lady who cursed Freya - i figured everybody could fill in the gap on their own, but just in case i didn't make it clear enough.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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